North Carolina votes to replace one anti-trans law with another and everyone is obviously outraged

When Democrat Roy Cooper ran for governor in 2016, he made one promise to his constituents: that he would work to repeal HB2, North Carolina's notorious anti-trans bathroom law.

Cooper has struggled to make good on his promise as Republicans in the state legislature opposed repealing the law. On Thursday, Republicans and Democrats came together to vote for HB142, just before the deadline it had been given by the NCAA, which is boycotting the state. LGBTQ groups are calling the replacement law a "scam."

It appears the bill was pushed through in an effort to lure back the basketball association, which said it would not allow North Carolina to host upcoming college championship games unless there were changes to the law made by Thursday.

HB2 required that transgender and non-confirming people use bathrooms in government facilities according to the sex assigned on their birth certificate and threatened to cost the state billions in lost revenue due to protests from businesses and sports teams. HB142 puts state legislators in charge of regulating public multi-stall bathrooms. That prohibits local officials from passing any bathroom regulations or anti-discrimination protections until 2020 which, they say, would give time for related court cases to be played out.

In other words, the bill removes the offending bathroom rule about birth certificates but also ensures no protections for the LGBTQ community will be enacted, unless approved by the state legislature.

Major LGBTQ rights groups and their allies were outraged, and they made it known on Twitter.

The bill is currently headed to Gov. Cooper, who has endorsed the bill and is expected to sign it.